What apps are you buying? Microsoft talks Windows Store trends

With Windows 8 and Windows Phone came Stores, designed to rival ecosystems from Apple and Google. Now the tech giant is on a mission to bring unification to the two ecosystems, probably something that should have been built into the design right from the start. Regardless, though, today Microsoft is offering a bit of insight into how the customers are using the Store.

This isn’t entirely new, as the company previously offered some information through the Explore Store Trends section of the Dashboard. However, now Microsoft is making a change based on the feedback it has received from those who used the feature. “Instead of using the Dashboard, starting this month we’re moving to a new format: periodic Windows Store Trends summary blog posts that will be used to share different views of the Windows Store”, announces the Windows Apps Team.

To kick this off, the team today reveals what it learned during the period between August 1st and October 31st. Unsurprisingly, games were the top category, trending at just over 30-percent. In fact, nothing else came particularly close, with entertainment, tools, social and others all relatively close together, though entertainment was the only one that managed to poke its head over the 10-percent mark. Despite that popularity, it was actually social that rated the highest ratio of downloads per app, well ahead of second place photos. Games, in this case, was a distant fourth.

While this information is rather interesting for consumers, it’s really designed for developers. It provides insight into what direction to go in when thinking of new apps and what categories fair best when submitting those apps. “We recommend you browse through the app catalog in the categories that you want to develop for, and analyze the top apps in each category to see what is making these apps successful. Learn from the leaders, select the category where you have the highest skill and most potential opportunity, and submit great apps”, Microsoft explains.